Spellbook
by Scarabbug
Summary: Things Bianca knows, but probably hasn’t told anyone else about. Another take on “Of Artisan Stock”, from another character’s perspective.
1. Knowing The Sound of Thunder

**Ten things Bianca knows, but probably hasn't told anyone else about. I guess this is another take on "Of Artisan Stock", from another character's perspective. Namely, Bianca. I wasn't planning it, but I was just recently reminded of the fact that I think Bianca's a damn interesting character and… it'd be nice to explore.**

**Standard disclaimers apply. Reviews and concrit are appreciated. **

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Spellbook: Pages One Throught Ten.**

**1. Knowing The Sound of Thunder. **

The first time Bianca killed someone, it hadn't been a mistake.

She was fairly sure the sorceress planned it, but to this day, Bianca doesn't know exactly how or why, and she can't work out what was so important about this particular Tiki Idol that she _had_ to turn him into a slug in the first place. Still, you don't argue with the sorceress, particularly not if you work for her.

'_Um… your highness, I think it's still moving…' _

'_So step on it already, fool. It's a bug, isn't it? _

'_But…' _

'_That's what you _do_ with insects, girl. You crush them. This thing is no longer important.'_

'_But I…wasn't it… a moment ago, sorceress, it was a…' _

'_Forget what it _wasNow_ it's a bug. So crush it already and move. We don't have time for childish sensitivity.' _

Bianca did, and the creature had squelched, as if it has never been a living idol made of stone.

It didn't take her long to catch on. The sorceress usually didn't care what her apprentice chose to _do_ with the prisoners they caught, provided she got _rid_ of them so that they never darkened the doorway again. Usually Bianca managed to avoid destroying people. Oh, she'd change them _into_ something alright. Usually a slug or some kind of small mammal incapable of speech or understanding. But then she'd release them into the fields and let them forget they had ever been sentient, mortal creatures. In this way, Bianca had avoided actually killing anyone with her own two hands for years. She would have been happy to keep it that way.

The sorceress caught the hummingbird doing reconnaissance in the Towers, and Bianca pulls her usual trick, transforming it into the requested obscure creature and, instead of standing on it or smashing it under a stone or something, she picks it up and carries it carefully out into the Surprise Springs, leaving it under the shade of a tree where it would be safe. Still no longer a biped or capable of cognitive speech, but safe.

Except that then the dragon showed up (she's fairly sure he's following her) and… How was she supposed to know that blasted dragonfly of his was partial to butterflies?

So the second time Bianca killed someone, it _had_ been a mistake. And she kind of took her anger out on the dragon, if only a little bit. She already knew he wasn't worth her time and attention, and she knew what she was supposed to do to get rid of him once and for all anyway. So she did it. Or tried to. A well placed energy bomb at just the right angle…

Except that that darn cat got in the way of her shot, and…

And actually, Bianca was kind of surprised that her death-count only stood at two, after delivering a chest-blast like that to someone of that build. She could imagine how much it hurt.

Hunter continued to insist that he wasn't the least bit angry about it. Bianca wondered if all the butterflies that Sparx had gone through during Spyro's time in the Forgotten Worlds would be as forgiving.

* * *

**Fic Explanation Section #1.**

**Granted, having to do this should probably mean that the fic isn't coherent enough in and of itself, but I think I have some interesting comments to add, so I'll do so. **

**The title of this ficlet,** "**She Knows The Sound of Thunder." Is actually a pun upon a famous science fiction story "**_**A Sound of Thunder**_**" by Wilbur Smith, in which a man causes a disastrous mutation of history by time-travelling back to the existence of the dinosaurs, and treading on a butterfly. **


	2. Half Unwanted Gifts

**Ten things Bianca knows, but probably hasn't told anyone else about. Another take on "Of Artisan Stock", from another character's perspective. ****Reviews and concrit are appreciated. **

**This fic takes place just before Bianca opens the sorceress's lair in the Midnight Mountain at the final battle of Spyro: Year of the Dragon. Standard disclaimers apply. **

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Half Unwanted Gifts. 

Bianca wasn't born with magical powers.

She had taken them. Or rather, she had tried to steal them, failed, and then been offered them instead. By the sorceress. It happened a long time ago or at least it _felt_ like a long time ago. Bianca wasn't certain _how_ long, precisely, except for the fact that she had been small enough when it happened that even the boulders stacked around outside the castle doors had seemed like mountains to her.

The Sorceress's castle in the Midnight Mountain was bright and tall and deceptively beautiful and every day, Bianca would stand below its walls and look up. That was what her people did – they stood on the outside of big things and looked _up_ at them, but were never a part of them. Bianca had heard that it was a habit of her species from long ago: they would stand and stare at bright and beautiful things, even if those bright, beautiful things could destroy them.

Bianca's people stole things. It was what they did, simply because it was the only way they could survive. They stole their food from the people in the Summer Plains, and their clothes and tools from the people in the Midday Gardens. She had to admit, though, going after the sorceress's magic had probably been a little greedy.

And there are days when she kind of… not _regrets_ it, exactly, but wishes she'd thought more about her actions, first. She'd never been one for thinking ahead.

She couldn't read as a child, after all. When you lived a place like the Lapine settlement in Crystal Caverns, learning the written language usually didn't stand out at the top of your to-do list. So why, exactly had she not thought to ask for different _kind_ of magic? One that didn't rely on spell books and incantations and _words_ she couldn't understand.

It had taken her two years just to grasp the meaning of the individual letters and words, another two years to be able to speak them even close to confidently. Even now she continues to mix up spellings and pronunciations. The important _kind_ of pronunciations than could mean the difference between changing a rabbit into a flower and changing a rabbit into a giant, killer monster with really big, blunt teeth and a taste for Lapines.

Turning a perfectly harmless bunny rabbit into a monster that immediately tried to eat you, _right _in front of your enemies… Yes, that hadn't exactly been the proudest moment of Bianca's life.

They aren't enemies now, though, which is more of a surprise to her than anyone else. And Spyro…

He doesn't _like_ her very much. He probably doesn't trust her either. But then again, if that's the case, then why is he allowing her to do this? Why is he allowing her to take the magic from his brothers and sisters and use it to unlock the door to the Sorceress's hidden lair? Why is he letting her _help_ when it's quite obvious he doesn't know how bad she feels about everything.

'_You let us go,'_ he says with what she supposes is a kind of dragon-shrug. As if that explains everything. Maybe it does. She's willing to leave things as they are right now and, having already felt what he's capable of, she'd really rather not annoy him any further.

Besides, she _wants_ to do this.

* * *

_It's the kind of thing you don't notice until you realise it isn't there anymore: the magic, that is. _

_The first time little Bianca became aware of it, was on the day the teleporters in her home world stopped working. Then her mother stopped being able to pull the little magical tricks she used to pull with glasses and mirrors. Music through glass and turning furniture into small creatures and other talents Bianca hadn't inherited. Those were the games she'd played with Bianca as a baby, to make her laugh. They thought at first that it was just the eclipse. The Night of Darkness happened once every two hundred years and… it'd been due. A simple glitch of magic, and nothing more. _

_And then the portals started dying, and Bianca realised something was wrong which was far worse than just an eclipse. _

* * *

'I talked to Hunter in Scorch a while ago…' Spyro says. 'He believes you, you know. I tried telling him it was crazy, but that didn't matter. He thinks you're doing this for us. Is that true?'

Bianca nods and says a private thank you to Hunter in her mind, but still Spyro still doesn't look as if he believes her. 'He might trust you, but I don't. You could be leading us into a trap.'

'But you still have to destroy her, right? The sorceress?' She whirls on him, cape hood down, face and form exposed. She's thought that showing him her form instead of hiding herself under the cape might've softened him up a little. She forgot.: dragons don't think about those kind of things. Their kind of magic lets them see through anything. He probably knew what she was from the beginning. 'Either way, the only way to do it is by getting through that door.' Bianca brandishes at the door behind her, glancing at it over her shoulder. 'You don't need to trust me, you just need to go through it.'

Spyro knows she's right. Still, he doesn't look too happy about it. If this is how he looks at her, Bianca wouldn't want to be the sorceress. That dragonfly of him flickers and sparkles, the same way it did when it ate the butterfly she conjured up in Midday gardens. Bianca is sure the Dragonfly doesn't trust her either.

* * *

_When she discovered what was happening, Bianca had left her realm and headed to the Midnight Mountains homeland. There, she had clambered up the icy vines on the outside walls of the castle and crept into the sorceress's dungeons. _

_The sorceress had found her, of course. And she had brought the Rhynocs with her. Bianca ran as fast as she could, but they had trapped her in no time, in a small room near the back of the castle, with the bottle of magic she had stolen still clutched tightly in her hands. _

'_Useless,' the sorceress had said. _

_Bianca remembers it. She remembers running for her life down the castle corridors, being tracked down, being caught, being held against the wall by a powerful burst of magic, the bottle she had stolen still grasped in her hand. _

'_There's no point in taking that. A creature such as yourself could never control it. What did you want it for anyway?' _

'_I…' _

_She tried to move, to escape. But the sorceress's magic held her fast. The tip of a wand brushed her face sending a chill right through her body. 'Think carefully, child. Your answer might depend on your answer.'_

* * *

'I'm not lying to you.'

'Like I said, I don't know whether I can believe that. so what happens when that door opens anyway?' Spyro glares at the door over her shoulder, as if it's just another monster she's conjured up in order to destroy him. 'Does the roof cave in or what? Just so you know, Sparx call tell when things like that are going to happen in advance, so don't even _try_ tricking us, because we'll know.' The dragonfly buzzes in agreement. He looks… pretty fierce for a little insect.

'I know he can,' she lies. In truth, she knows hardly anything about dragons except for the fact that they a) hatch from eggs and b) are incredibly tricky both to get rid of and to get back, depending on which you're trying to do.

'We're not so different.'

'Oh, _please_, what exactly do _we_ have in common?'

'Hunter, for one thing,' Bianca says, calmly, and for once she is certain of her answer. It's strange. Thinking about someone else is not something which has ever made Bianca's life any easier before.

Spyro's expression changes when she says that. He can't argue.

* * *

'_And… and the magic's dying everywhere.' Her explanations were running out. She'd told the sorceress everything, because she feared she would die if she left out so much as a single thing. She was also still held up against the wall, and the wand was still pointed at her chest. Even though it hurt, it was still comforting, in a way, because it had been so long since she'd felt fresh magic. 'The portals don't work… I had to walk here, all the way…So you see, I… I didn't want this for me. I wanted it…' _

'_For your parents, is that right?' The sorceress leered. 'For your people and your home. You mean to bring life back to them by returning your homeland's disappearing magic. It's a bad plan. The magic you hold in that bottle can only be ingested by a living being with enough brainpower to use it correctly. Its effects on your world would be temporary, at best. You have come on a fool's errand, girl. _

_Bianca blinked, confused, worried, intensely frightened. _

'_Look around you, brat. The rest of the _world_ is dying, surely you realise? The magic you have stolen is one of the few examples left in this world. I am the only creature left that can give you what you desire.' _

* * *

'You're doing what I ask because _he_ says you should, right? Bianca asked. Spyro shuffled a little, still keeping his eyes cold and locked on the doorway. Funny, Bianca realises, that she should now be standing where she has always stood – the one thing in between him and the sorceress. 'You still don't trust me at all.'

'Maybe. Or maybe just think the sorceress needs getting rid of enough for you to not be important anymore,' Spyro mutters. Bianca nods. She gets the feeling she was _never_ that important to him in the first place.

'Yeah… You also know that my world is dying and it's going to keep dying if the dragons go away again.'

'I didn't say I was going to let that happen.'

'You'd better not,' Bianca mutters, surprising herself with her ability to continue to fake a threatening air. Of course, it has no more affect on Spyro now than it did the hundreds of times before. Heck, he wasn't even fazed by her turning into a rainbow right in front of him, or conjuring up a monster to destroy him.

'Since when were you any good at making threats?' Spyro snapped. 'I got them back once. You take them away and I'll get them back again.'

Bianca nods. She knows she couldn't do that anyway. The dragons are mostly hatched now –many of them broke from their shells the moment Spyro touched them– and would be decidedly more difficult to catch. She doesn't know where the fairy is keeping them, but Bianca knows there's no point in asking. Spyro isn't likely to tell _her_.

'If my world dies…'

'Them I'll be to blame, yeah, I know. But I've never let a world die. C'mon, Bianca,' Spyro scowls. 'It's a lose-lose situation either way, but at least _my_ way you have a chance. Hunter wasn't kidding when he said he might convince the dragons to come back. Hell, I'll even help him once I'm sure the sorceress is gone for good.'

It's what she expected him to say. Angry with her as he might be, Spyro isn't selfish. He won't put the rights of one world above another. Maybe he's been struggling with this the whole time, just as much as Bianca has.

She's right, really –they aren't so different. Except…

Except for that she still would've chosen her world over his. 'There's something else you should know… she's using the dragon magic directly, her sceptre has been reconstructed and she's using a suspended dragon egg as her power source.'

She see's Spyro tense up a little. 'You mean…'

'I mean she's got a dragon egg attached to the thing and therefore has all the potential; abilities you do on top of all her own.' Bianca finished.

'Why're you…'

'Telling you this? What, did you think my help would stop at just opening the door? I meant what I said. I want to help. Oh, and that monkey ho claims you rescued him, by the way… I mentioned this to him; he'll be there, too.'

'You've thought of everything, haven't you?'

'No. just the things she would've thought of. You she might be expecting to see, but I somehow doubt she'll be expecting a monkey wielding a 9-500 laser gun.'

* * *

'_You could be useful to me… you were daring enough to at least try and steal what belongs to me. You might even have succeeded had you been a little smarter than you look. But you didn't. With my help, you could be more powerful than anything that bottle contains.' _

'…_More powerful than you?' It was a silly question, she realised the moment she'd asked it. The sorceress laughed at her for the first of many times. _

'_I wouldn't go that far, brat. Maybe I should phrase it differently: you don't have any choice in the matter. I can kill you now, for invading my domain… for attempting to _steal_ from me. Or I can put you to a purpose that could not be served so well by your corpse… granted I've been messing around with the idea of bringing back the dead…' Bianca shivered uneasily, getting the feeling the sorceress meant it. 'But no… it's not appropriate'_

'_What… what do you want me to do?'_

'_Will you do anything to stay alive? And to save your world?'_

_Bianca nodded before she could help herself. 'Then you'll have to work for me, and maybe we can find a way of saving this world and everything in it.'_

'_You don't believe me,' the sorceress said calmly and, as if to emphasise her point, she realised her hold and Bianca felt herself drop to her knees, the bottle clattering on the floor. 'There's no need to be suspicious. I've needed an apprentice for a while… stupid as you are, there might be hope for you in the magic department. I don't suppose you can read, girl?'_

'_N…no.' Bianca wasn't even all that certain just what reading was. _

'_Pity. But we can work through that. I'll even give you that bottle you were trying to run off with. Call it an initiation gift. Wouldn't you like that?' _

_Bianca knew from the stories her mother had told her that the sorceress never did anything nice for anyone, especially not thieves. But seeing as she'd probably be killed anyway… 'Yes… I would… I would like that.' _

'_I thought so. Get off the floor.'_

_Bianca stood up. _

_That was the day the dusty, box filled room had become hers, and the sorceress has been in her head ever since. _

_She had also given Bianca the very power she would need one day, in order to help someone else destroy her mistress. _

* * *

Bianca has never been able to read out a proper spell in her life. But now, when she holds out her hands before the door to the room the sorceress has sealed herself within, she gets the incantation word perfect first time.

'_Open.' _Still, he might not be afraid of anything, but that doesn't mean he's got the power to defeat the sorceress.

The door creaks, the shackles break, and the door opens in a splash of rainbow light. Spyro doesn't thank her, or hesitate before entering, but then, she never expected him to. He has met every challenge she's thrown at him so far with exactly the same vigour and enthusiasm. She would've admired him earlier, if he hasn't torched her the way he did. She stands and watches him enter the doorways with the dragonfly close being him.

And then he paused. 'Oh, yeah, almost forget: Hunter told me to tell you to meet him in Scorch if I saw him around. He'll be waiting in the temple. Don't worry about the scorpions and Rhynocs –I already took care of them.'

…_Scuba diving lessons_? Bianca raises her eyebrows. 'I… I beg your pardon?'

Spyro gives another vaguely amused dragon-shrug. 'Don't ask me, witch girl. I just brought him with me; I'm not responsible for the trouble he gets into whenever I leave him on his own.'

'_Am I trouble?'_ Bianca thinks, but doesn't say aloud, because she already knows what his answer would be, and she knows that he's probably right, too. She _is_ trouble; she always was even before she got magic. But maybe Spyro is trouble too, just in a different way to her.

'Guy's scared of getting his fur wet, you know,' Spyro says, as he advances into the room. She always had him tagged as the 'less talk, more action' kind of guy, but now, he seems almost… conversational. And with her, no less. 'But he wants to take you _scuba diving_… he's a strange one kinda weird, but he's still my friend, so… watch it.'

Bianca doesn't argue, she simply nods as he walks into the chamber and vanishes from view and she finds herself hoping and praying that the sorceress doesn't kill him, the way she's killed so many others.

She probably won't.

In fact, when she thinks about the fact that she herself, has actually been able to outsmart the sorceress on this one occasion, and use the magic of the world against her… Bianca thinks it's more than likely that Spyro will be able to destroy the sorceress, too.

She doesn't know how she'll explain all of this to Hunter if Spyro doesn't came back.

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**Fic Explanation #2**

**What's to say about this one?**

**I noticed another moral issue concerning Spyro was – exactly what does happen to the Forgotten World if Spyro releases all the hatchlings and sends them back to the Dragon Worlds? Doesn't it… you know, **_**die**_** again? I understand that there's ways around it (example: send half the hatchlings back, keep half in the Forgotten World) but I'm not sure a guy like Spyro really thought of that. **

**However I also know that Spyro isn't the kind of person who would put one world over another: he helped the Forgotten Worlds as he did his own, and somehow managed to help both at once. **

**The idea that the magic has been dying for centuries is not an odd one, given that the dragons were banished a thousand years ago. I'm just guessing that it really started to make itself evident in recent years.

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	3. Knowing That You Have Trust Issues

**Another little one shot. Unbetaed. Set during the events of "year of the Dragon", just after the "An Apology, and Lunch" and during the "The escape" cut scene, if any of you can actually remember which scenes those titles stand for... Hm. **

**Standard disclaimers apply. Reviews and concrit are, as ever, appreciated.

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Knowing That You Have Trust Issues. 

It wasn't that he didn't _like_ her.

'See it wasn't just a skate park, it was like, huge! Did you know you even had places like that in this world? We totally don't have anything that cool in Avalar. And Spyro's really good at skateboarding, for a guy with four feet...'

No, Bianca had enough intuition to know better than that. On the contrary, Hunter seemed surprisingly _fond_ of her, especially given his current situation. And it wasn't really that he didn't _trust_ her either, even though he probably shouldn't.

It was more the fact that...

'...Course I told Elora that we could just let him torch the guy and I could get the talisman's but I guess she kinda didn't think I'd be able to keep them safe...'

Well, Hunter was telling Bianca a story about Spyro. About something that the dragon did for him once. For all of his people, in fact. He told her while leaning against the bars of the cage where the sorceress was keeping him, talking to Bianca as if she were just an old friend rather than the servant of the person who had imprisoned him. Bianca sat on the floor outside, with her knees pulled up to her chest, listening and trying not to be amazed by what she heard.

'...And then there was the time that dumb Artisan guy got my feet stuck in rock. Huh. I tell you, if it wasn't for Spyro...'

Actually, it was more like listening to a lot of _little_ stories put together than one big one. Spyro, it seemed, has done an awful lot of world-saving in his short life.

Spyro's own world had been attacked some time before the Year of the Dragon, leaving Spyro the only member of his species alive and functioning. He'd travelled the entire world, all on his own, freeing members of his species along the way before eventually defeating Gnasty Gnorc himself (Bianca had no idea who Gnasty Gnorc was, but Hunter said something about him being "even meaner than the sorceress", so...).

'Did you know that a Gnorc is like, a cross between an Orc and a Gnome? And just as _ugly_ as both of those are, too. They're made outta gemstones, like all the Rhynocs here are, y'see, and...'

And then not long after he sorted out that awful mess, Spyro had succeeded in usurping an evil dictator (single pawedly, Hunter made a point of adding) in a distant realm by the name of "Avalar" (which Bianca remembered only vaguely from books she had read in her childhood). The dictator's name, Bianca said, had been _Ripto. _

She had to admit, he sounded a lot scarier than the Sorceress. And that was really saying something.

'...We were kinda working with what we had handy,' Hunter said. 'I mean we couldn't just let Spyro couldn't go up against Ripto alone. Using the orbs like that was really a last minute idea in the first place. Zoe came up with it. She's good at that kind of stuff.'

'Zoe?'

'Oh, she's the fairy. Little lady,' Hunter held his hands a few inches apart to demonstrate. 'Like this. But don't let her hear you saying that 'cause she's got some damn good electricity spells and she knows how to use 'em. And she's really, _really_ strong for such a little thing. Gulp tried to eat her once and she hit him in the eye with her wand. _Twice_.'

Bianca smiled faintly and decided to take his word for it. 'Ouch...And then what happened? When Spyro went up against Ripto, I mean.'

'What? Oh, uh... no idea. I think I got hit by a flying rock or something about halfway into the fight and blacked out.'

So it wasn't that Hunter didn't trust her. If he didn't then he probably wouldn't be telling her this in the first place, as it pretty much amounted to giving her important information about her enemy. Hunter probably wasn't actually bright enough to realise he was doing that. It's more the fact that he was... unsure about her. Kept giving her looks as if he was trying to figure her out, and probably failing.

'That was really brave of you, you know.'

'What, the flying over the arena thing? Nah, Elora made me do that. Being brave... that's always kinda been Spyro's department.'

'Then what's yours?'

Hunter seemed to have to really think about this point for a long time before he could come up with an answer. 'Um, find the eggs and try not to die?'

Bianca felt a smile tweak her lips. 'Oh-kay. Explanatory enough, I guess.'

Somehow Bianca had a feeling that if the sorceress did happen to come down here and try using one of her famous "Veracity Spells" on Hunter, she wouldn't get much information out of him regardless of how well the spell worked. Nonetheless, the sorceress hadn't really bothered to try any truth spells anyway – it was common knowledge that species such as Hunter's were not easily affected by magical spells of any kind anyway. This was probably why he'd dealt so well with being pelted in the stomach by a ball of light-energy.

Yeah. _Ouch_.

No, if Hunter had any purpose to the sorceress right now, then it was bait. Bait to get Spyro here so she could kill him. Or maybe bait to scare him into staying away. Either option didn't say much for Hunter's survival chances.

'I meant what I said, you know,' Hunter's voice pulled her out of her trail of though. 'About asking the dragons to come back, I mean.'

'And so did I when I said I can't let you out.'

'Never said you had to. I don't want anyone to die.' He shrugged. 'And lots of people will, if the here magic disappears completely, won't they?'

'Yes. I suppose quite a few of them will.' So many people were dependent on magic here. It flowed in their veins like blood and oxygen. There was no way that some people's bodies – people like the sorceress, for example – would be able to adjust to a world without any magic whatsoever. Besides, the economy of pretty much every realm in the world would collapse, machinery would break down, systems would come to a grinding halt. Without magic they had no power, and without power, they had nothing.

Hunter was quiet for a moment, and his tail kept curling into weird, almost amusing patterns. 'Will you die?'

Bianca hesitated.

She had never really thought about it like that. Had never really imagined the effect that losing all of her magic would have on her. 'I'm... not very good with magic,' she said, after a pause. 'Most of my spells never work properly... and I got my powers from the sorceress, so...'

Hunter scratched his head. 'That's not really what I asked, Bianca.'

'Alright then. I don't know. I don't know if I'll die. But I don't think it'll be very comfortable. It'd be losing something that I've had for such a very long time. You understand?'

'Hey, man, I'm sittin' here in a cage on an empty stomach, you don't have to talk to me about comfort.'

'We've already been through that, Hunter. I can't let you out of the cage.'

'But you still came back here.' Hunter said.

Bianca frowned. 'Yeah, so?'

'So she told you not to go near me again,' Hunter said, plainly, as if it were just a piece of common knowledge. 'Didn't she?'

Bianca shifted. '...I never told you that.'

'You didn't have to; it's written all over your face.'

...Okay, so maybe he wasn't quite as dense as he was making himself out to be. Or maybe he was just smarter than he knew he was. He smiled at her, apparently with no idea of the impact of what he had said. Bianca bristled, the fur prickling on the back of her neck. 'It is?'

'Yeah, cats have six senses so we know these things, did you know that? Like how you have magic, we know what people are thinking... or at least we're supposed to. It kinda doesn't work a lot. Or ever.' he paused. 'Okay so I was just kinda guessing.'

'...Good guess.'

'Thanks! I think.'

Bianca wasn't sure if he was just playing around with her right now, or if he was being serious.

'You realise this is a completely screwed up situation?' Bianca sighed, leaning back on her hands in the dirt. 'You told me that Spyro doesn't like letting good people die, but he's been charging about taking out the Rhynocs with no regard for them.'

'But.. .the sorceress made the Rhynocs.'

'That doesn't matter, though, does it?' Bianca asked. Hunter didn't seem to have an answer for her. 'And what about you? You're still here. He hasn't stopped fighting... I think he's looking for you.'

'I think he knows the sorceress probably won't kill me, not while she can still use me as bait.'

'He really knows that? Seems like he's taking a big chance to me. I mean, he's already seen me whack you with an energy bomb.'

'Which you were aiming at _him_.'

Bianca felt herself smiling. 'That what you told him?''

'...Actually yeah,' Hunter half grinned, but the smile faded quickly. 'I guess... just stopping when the bad guy tells him to isn't exactly Spyro's style.'

'Why? Because that would be giving up? Even if not giving up puts you in danger?'

Hunter shuffled. 'You really don't understand him, do you?

'No I don't,' Bianca said evenly, and mentally she added: but I think I understand you pretty well. Even if I don't really know what you're thinking. 'But then again, I'm not really sure I _want_ to. What about what happens to this world when he takes all the eggs away again? Does he care about that? We've worked so hard to keep this world alive, Hunter... the dragon eggs are our only chance.'

'Which um... brings me right back to my earlier point about getting him to bring the dragons back here?' Hunter suggested. He sounded a little less sure about the chances of this plan working than he had before, but if anything Bianca admired his perseverance.

'And why, exactly, should I trust you, Hunter?' Bianca asked, calmly. Suddenly remembering the cheetah's seemingly fierce loyalty to the small dragon that was causing havoc in the realms above. 'This could be a trap.'

'I... yeah, guess it could,' Hunter admitted. Well, at least he didn't try and lie to her.

Bianca stood up very carefully, brushing the dust from her knees before she turned to walk out of the room.

She was pretty certain that Hunter watched her leave.

* * *

"_**That's it. I've had enough. I'm going to create a monster to end all monsters! And I'm going to send it out to destroy all the dragons, even the little hatchlings."

* * *

**_

'Stupid, stupid, _stupid_...!'

She should've known this was coming.

When Bianca was just a small girl, not long after she had first been employed by the sorceress (she believed that particular stage of her training had involved washing an awful lot of dishes) the sorceress had sent her armies into The Midnight Mountain, claiming she was looking for a new magical power source to make up for her dying supplies. The "new source" they had returned with was a number of the Local Magical-Wizards, whom had been locked up in her dungeons, to be drained of their magic one by one in the coming weeks.

Then again when Bianca first began training seriously as her apprentice, she had been sent to track down all the Mountain Kangaroos of the Alps. The sorceress had said that they were "relocating" the creatures to a new colony somewhere so that she could mine the jewels in the mountains. Oh, they'd been _relocated_ alright – relocated to the burning pits of Molten Valley, where moist of them died within weeks from smoke inhalation and the oppressive heat.

So really, Bianca knew that she should've figured it out by now the sorceress wasn't one for telling the truth about really important things. Not when lying would prevent panic and/or rebellion. So Bianca should've realised she was lying, about just keeping the dragons here.

She should have known the sorceress had been planning to kill them from the start.

'_**What did you **_**think**_** I was going to do with all those dragons? Open a **_**zoo**_**?' **_

Stupid,' Bianca muttered to herself again, while racing down the corridor in the direction of the dungeon. Or at least she thought it was the direction of the dungeon. She was so worked up she hadn't thought to check the map in her spell book first.

She practically burst into the cell, tripping on the doorframe as she did so and ordering the Rhynoc standing guard (a short purple guy with big eyes... how ironic) away as she did so. Hunter was, of course, exactly where she'd left him an entire day ago.

'Hey, Bianca. Did you bring anymore food? I'm starving...'

Good to see that he had his priorities sorted.

Bianca caught her breath. 'There's no time for that, Hunter. We have to stop the sorceress. She's going to kill all the dragon hatchlings.'

Hunter (who had looked a little surprised by her apparent change of heart, at least until she mentioned the dragon hatchlings, flinched away from the bars as Bianca started messing with the lock. Damn thing was magically sealed; there was no way she'd get into it with just a key. 'Wait... when you say _kill them _you mean?'

'I _mean_ that she's going to destroy them all slowly and painfully with every ounce of magic she has, remove their wings and use them to make an immortality potion,' Bianca elaborated, still pulling at the lock. There was a tiny voice inside of her head screaming at her that this was a really, really bad idea, but Bianca just told it to shut up. After all it hadn't been much help to her for the last twelve years, so why should she start listening to it now? 'I should've known this from the start; she never cares about anyone but herself... Oh, damn it, how do I get this lock?'

'Uh... well if I knew that I probably would've been outta here by now.'

She could practically feel Hunter looking at her, as if he was trying to work out just how serious she was. 'Hey wait a minute... Why should I trust you? This could be another trap.'

Bianca resisted the urge to role her eyes. And he thought it was _her_ who has the issues. 'You're in a cage, you furry numskull! How can I trap you by letting you out?'

Hunter looked at her. 'I don't know. You sorceress types can be _sneaky_.'

Bianca blinked.

Yeah. He was taking the mick, wasn't he? Stupid cheetah. 'Oh... we don't have time for this!'

Trying to ignore the smile on his face, Bianca fired a quick bolt of lightning into the lock of the cage, swung the door open, reached in and grabbed his hand.

Hunter pretty much stopped grinning when she did that. In fact, if Bianca didn't know better, she could've sworn he was blushing.

'I never thought she was going to hurt the dragons,' Bianca said, as firmly as she could manage, as if she could force him to believe her with the strength of her words alone. Maybe she could, because he certainly seemed to start smiling again as she pulled him along after her. 'Come on, we don't have time for this.'

'Bianca, wait a sec—!'

Hunter screeched to a halt, pulling her to a stop with him. She didn't let go of his arm as she turned to face him, still catching her breath from her race down the corridors. 'You mean you're actually gonna trust Spyro with this? You're gonna help him free the other dragon eggs? You're going to help us?'

It was a really bad time to be pausing and thinking about things like this, Bianca knew, but something else also told her that she'd probably never get another chance. And Hunter was looking at her with the same curious, somewhat interested face that he'd worn the time in Sunrise Springs, when she'd hit him with that energy attack. Curious when he should have been scared, interested when he should have been repulsed.

'No,' she said, softly. 'I'm not going to trust Spyro, but you're a different story, Hunter.'

He didn't say anything to that. He just allowed her to pull him through the corridors of the castle, avoiding the Rhynocs as best she could.

Bianca knew that she had never trusted anyone, really. Not since the day she started working for the sorceress. Not since the day she realised that the sorceress would never tell truths when lies came to her so much easier.

But on that day in the dungeons of the Mountain castle, she found that she trusted Hunter without a moment's hesitation. '...Yes. Now hurry up, we've got an entire species to rescue.'

* * *


End file.
